FEATURE: Start-Up Stirs Up Men’s Weekly Sector
The troubled men’s magazine sector is set to feel the heat from an aggressive newcomer, with the news that a team of magazine industry heavyweights is gearing up to launch a new free competitor into the weekly market.
The plan is to create a half-million circulation title, which has a working title of Alpha One, with an associated website possibly in September or later in the autumn.
Former Nuts editor, Phil Hilton, will edit the title, whilst the team includes industry bigwigs such as former FHM editor Mike Soutar, who is backed by film producer Matthew Vaughn and French Connection founder Stephen Marks.
Content is to be aimed at 18 to 35-year-old ABC1 men, and will include sport, entertainment, motoring, travel and news. It will be updated at 7am each day on the website.
The magazine will be distributed nationally to commuters in London, Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow, Edinburgh and West Yorkshire, backed by a £2 million marketing budget.
It will carry listings timed for the weekend with Thursday the expected distribution day. The content will not be localised at the start, but this is being looked at.
It is likely that the new title will compete with paid-for weeklies Nuts and Zoo, and the free weekly Sport, whilst the digital arm of the title could directly compete with online lads mag, Monkey.
In February, Dennis Publishing’s Monkey, which launched on 1 November 2006 (see Dennis Launches New Online Lads Mag), reported a debut ABCe of 209,612, twice the publication’s original target of 100,000 (see ABC Results Jul-Dec 2006: TV Listings On Top Whilst Digital Only Mag A Success).
ABCe unique user figures for January sit at 268,348, whilst Nielsen//NetRatings reports a figure of 347,000.
Sport, which was launched in London last September by Sport Media & Strategy (see Free Sport Magazine Launches In London), targets 18-40-year-old ABC1 men and is handed out weekly, primarily to commuters. It currently reports an ABC just shy of 322,000.
Meanwhile, Nuts and Zoo both recorded circulation declines at the last ABC consumer magazine concurrent release. Emap’s weekly, Zoo, shed almost 56,000 copies year on year for July to December 2006, to leave it with a total circulation of around 204,000.
IPC’s weekly, Nuts, recorded a circulation figure of over 295,000, although it too suffered a year on year drop, of almost 4% or an actual figure of 11,800 copies.
The men’s monthly market fared similarly, with market leader FHM hit hardest in actual terms, dropping more than 129,000 copies from its circulation year on year, leaving it with a total figure of around 371,000 copies.
In percentage terms, both Maxim, published by Dennis Publishing, and IPC’s Loaded felt large declines, falling by around 29% and 30% respectively year on year.
Maxim has a total circulation of 131,497, whilst Loaded‘s total rests at 162,554. However, Haymarket’s Stuff added around 9,500 copies to its total, which now sits at 100,265.
Publisher of Monkey, James Mallinson, feels that the new entry on to the market has a real chance of being successful.
“Everyone has been crying out for innovation in the market,” he told NewsLine. “There has actually been nothing like this in the market before – fair play to them. I think they’ll do a good job.”
Mallinson said the team behind the launch was “really good”, hinting that another big name was also involved. “Commercially and editorially it should be a success, good luck to them,” he said.
“What they’re saying right now is they will sell or distribute more than Zoo and Nuts combined – that’s a pretty powerful sell,” Mallinson admitted. “I can’t imagine the news went down particularly well at IPC and Emap.”
Mallinson believes there is a gap in the market for an upmarket (print) men’s weekly, and speculated that the tone of the new kid on the block could be different from the other weeklies already on the market.
The Monkey chief also said he did not think the newcomer would be a direct competitor to his own offering. “I haven’t got a crystal ball but I don’t think it will necessarily harmfully impact on Monkey, and the reason being is 70% of Monkey‘s readers don’t read a men’s weekly or monthly, so we’ve managed to grow the marketplace,” he said.
“I think [Crash Test Media] are equally going to grow the marketplace. We grew the market, they can grow the market, and they are saying they’ll grow it bigger than us, so fair play to them.”
Soutar, who founded media start-up Crash Test Media last October after leaving IPC, where he headed new magazine ventures, will take up the role of chief executive in the as-yet-unnamed company.
Karl Marsden, who resigned as commercial director of News International’s News Magazines, joins as managing director. He was previously commercial director of IPC’s men’s division, Ignite!
Hilton, who was launch editor of Men’s Health and Nuts, becomes editorial director. Tim Ewington, a research and strategy consultant, who has worked on print and digital launches for the Guardian, the BBC and Lastminute.com, joins as strategy and digital director, whilst Matt Phare, formerly creative director for Emap’s men’s portfolio, is the creative director.
The investor group in the new company, which will have “a mid to high seven figure” financing, will be headed by former IPC chairman and Emap group managing director Sir David Arculus.
The investors are: GLG Partners LP, a British hedge fund; DC Thomson, the Scottish publisher; French Connection’s Marks; and film and media company, Marv Partners, led by Vaughn and Kris Thykier.
In April, it was rumoured that Emap was considering the launch of a free men’s magazine in an attempt to reinvigorate its consumer magazines portfolio (see Emap Considering Launch Of Free Men’s Mag).
Today reports have come out that the company, which recently reported revenue for its UK consumer magazines division down 8% this quarter on last (see Media In The City: Dow Jones Listens To Alternative Bids), is set to launch a digital fashion product.
The publishing giant’s consumer media arm is said to have drafted in Geoff Campbell, the former executive publishing director of Emap Australia’s men’s division, to work on a fashion-based online project.
Dennis Publishing: 020 7907 6000 www.dennis.co.uk Emap: 01733 568 900 www.emap.co.uk